mid-day: How did the idea for ExObjects emerge? Was there a trigger, or were such thoughts stewing for a while?
AT Boyle: THE trigger was the deaths of my parents during COVID-19. The aim of exObjects (Om Books) is not to produce factual accounts or diary writing or grief memoirs. Instead, its motivation is to look hard, imaginatively and with the hope of finding peace through new understanding. I believe that it’s only by not swerving away, keeping a focused gaze, spending time, over time considering difficult emotions that things that lie under the surface, some that perhaps were not said at the time, are able to show themselves and be perceived in a more holistic sense, from a distance.

The rose gold watch features in one of AT Boyle’s accounts; (right) Ramona Sen’s heartfelt account involves her father’s favourite blue Santa tie